Ukraine's Foreign Affairs: a Sullied Image's Effects
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No. 1 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, JANUARY 6, 2002 7 2001: THE YEAR IN REVIEW late as November 28 U.S. Ambassador Carlos Pascual February 4. He said Ukraine was moving into a more Ukraine’s foreign affairs: claimed that in the eyes of the United States the mature stage of its diplomatic relations and would place Gongadze affair was not over and that Ukraine still had an accent on developing its “European characteristics” to resolve the case to clear the black mark from its and promulgating the country’s economic interests in its a sullied image’s effects record. diplomatic efforts as “ambassadors of Ukrainian busi- By the time of the visit of German Chancellor ness.” or Ukraine, 2001 should have been a year dedicat- Schroeder to Kyiv on December 6, those types of He acknowledged, however, that a new pragmatic ed, first and foremost, to celebrating as the country remarks were becoming much less strident. At a press chapter in relations with Russia had opened and that marked its first decade as an independent state (see conference at the Mariinsky Palace Mr. Schroeder’s reply bilateral cooperation had taken on a “realistic and practi- separate section on the 10th anniversary celebrations). to a question on Ukraine’s human rights was taciturn and cal meaning.” He underscored that a policy of close-knit FThe celebratory mood was marred, however, by contro- even accommodating. relations with Russia was not mutually exclusive with versy and intrigue surrounding the disapparance of an While admitting that, “I don’t think things are alto- Ukraine’s new pro-European policy. independent journalist in September 2000 and the appear- gether good,” he explained that “things have the possibil- On January 18-20 high-ranking defense officials of ance of secret recordings that implicated the Ukrainian ity of improving.” Mr. Schroeder also let it be known that both countries met in Kyiv and presented one aspect of president and top government officials in the affair. Ukraine’s international standing in the eyes of Germany the new attitude when they put aside what had been The controversy known variously as “Gongadzegate” was where it should be. “We not only do not have any undercurrents of competitiveness and mistrust to sign a and “Tapegate” greatly influenced Ukraine’s foreign problems in our relations, they are very good as well,” 52-point agreement on cooperation in the next year, affairs in 2001 and affected Ukraine’s standing in the stated Mr. Schroeder as a satisfied President Kuchma including an increase in cooperation in the Black Sea international community. The country was all but ostra- looked on. region and in technology modernization. cized in the first half of the year. In fact, no Western While Western leaders were rare in Ukraine in 2001, The agreement produced all sorts of international and leader visited Kyiv in 2001 until the last month of the Russian President Vladimir Putin was there several times. domestic concerns – not the least of which was a fear by year, when German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder paid a His most important appearance in the country came the West that the two countries would now pool their call after the scandals had quieted and, for all practical two days after some 5,000 demonstrators called for Mr. resources in new weapons production. purposes, had become dormant. Kuchma’s political head in Kyiv. Then Mr. Putin flew The military accord raised the hairs of Western leaders Officials in Washington showed they were not going into the southern city of Dnipropetrovsk for a previously when Ukraine’s Minister of Defense Oleksander Kuzmuk to ignore the affair in the first days of the New Year. On scheduled meeting with Mr. Kuchma in what many told reporters that the agreement would not only mark the January 10 Steven Sestanovich, special assistant to the Western media outlets called a move to prop up the fal- beginning of closer cooperation between the two military U.S. secretary of state with responsibility for the former tering Kuchma administration. forces, but also between the military-industrial establish- Soviet states, called for “a speedy and transparent investi- The two sides signed 16 assorted bilateral documents ments of the two countries in “the creation of new sorts gation” into Heorhii Gongadze’s apparent murder. on closer economic and trade relations, the most impor- of arms and production.” But the scandal went truly international on January 25 tant of which were deals on the joint development of mil- A Ukrainian Ministry of Defense spokesman tempered when the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of itary and space technology, including cooperation in those remarks a few days later when he said the coopera- Europe (PACE) officially condemned the lack of freedom research and development of joint missile production. tion initially would be only in the realm of technology of expression in Ukraine and agreed to organize an inde- The two countries also agreed to support each other in the modernization. pendent investigation into certain aspects of the modernization and upgrading of heavy machinery facto- The two sides also agreed on a controversial joint Gongadze affair. While PACE refrained from sanctioning ries, many of which are directly connected to the mili- naval force in Sevastopol, which would have responsibil- Ukraine for its less than pristine human rights record of tary-industrial sector. ity for navigational command-control over sea traffic into late, it voted to take responsibility for an independent Finally, in a controversial agreement, Ukraine decided and out of the port of Sevastopol and would oversee analysis of the audiotapes allegedly recorded in the to reconnect to Russia’s electric grid, which would give search and rescue operations in the area. Some Ukrainian Ukrainian president’s office and to give their source the energy-starved country access to Russian electricity politicians thought the agreement ceded too much control political asylum. generation. over Sevastopol’s waters to Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. The human rights body, which consists of representa- While expressing satisfaction with the agreements, Mr. And yet another point of concern arose when The tives of the parliaments of Europe, also agreed to conduct Putin also underscored that he had not taken advantage of Financial Times reported that Kyiv had given Moscow an independent DNA analysis of the body allegedly Mr. Kuchma’s shaky political situation in getting the veto rights over international military exercises on belonging to Mr. Gongadze, which was found outside accords. The day before the Dnipropetrovsk meeting he Ukraine’s territory. A Ukrainian military official refuted Kyiv in mid-November. explained the situation between Moscow and Kyiv: that assertion, while giving assurances that Ukraine dis- PACE again raised its collective voice regarding “Leonid Kuchma is the legally elected president of cusses the details of international military exercises on its Ukraine on April 15 when it voted to recommend to its Ukraine. We will cooperate with him. We are not going to territory, including U.S.-sponsored Peace Shield and Sea Committee of Ministers that it should suspend Ukraine’s suspend our cooperation, as Russia has the right to count Breeze maneuvers, only with the countries involved. membership. While the action was never taken, the vote on a certain stability in relations with its partners.” Ukraine-Russia economic relations attained a new came after Hanne Severinsen, a PACE member and rap- The agreements reached during the Russian presi- level of visibility on May 10 when President Putin porteur on Ukraine, charged Kyiv with abuse of human dent’s visit in many respects were but mere tiles in a announced that he had named former Prime Minister and civil rights. mosaic of new cooperation between Kyiv and Moscow Viktor Chernomyrdin, one of the most powerful figures “It concerns misuse of authority, particularly oppres- laid over the course of 2001 in political, military and eco- in Russian politics and business over the past decade, as sion of freedom of speech and oppression of opposition,” nomic relations – all part of a new foreign relations doc- the new ambassador to Ukraine and his special envoy on Ms. Severinsen told Radio Liberty, underscoring that the trine Ukraine had announced at the beginning of the year. economic and trade relations. president of Ukraine was specifically responsible. Minister of Foreign Affairs Anatolii Zlenko officially In announcing the move, President Putin said: “We The next day the U.S. State Department announced presented the new approach in a major policy address on would have difficulty finding a person who better knows that the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service had granted political asylum to Myroslava Gongadze, the spouse of the murdered journalist, and their 3-year-old twin daughters, along with Maj. Mykola Melnychenko, the presidential bodyguard who allegedly recorded the president’s conversations. Another international organization, the Committee to Protect Journalists, also leveled criticism, although in a different manner, when on May 3 it named President Leonid Kuchma to its list of the 10 Worst Enemies of the Press for 2001, an annual compilation of world leaders who are responsible for the worst abuses against the news media. Mr. Kuchma joined such notorious figures as Liberian President Charles Taylor, Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. In an example of how quickly positions change in the fragile world of international politics, by autumn the Council of Europe had begun tempering its unyielding criticism of the human rights situation in Ukraine and the way the government had mishandled the Gongadze case. On September 27 PACE issued a resolution that contin- ued to criticize Ukraine but at the same time underscored that Ukraine was making progress in meeting human rights objectives and fulfilling promises it had made upon entering the organization in 1995.